1. Field
One embodiment of the invention relates to an information processor, a failure prediction method, and a computer product.
2. Description of the Related Art
Information processors such as personal computers (PCs) are often provided with an optical disc drive (ODD) to read data from/write data to an optical disc including a compact disk (CD) and a digital versatile disk (DVD). The ODD has a disc tray on which an optical disc is placed, and is provided with a loading mechanism such as a loading motor for ejecting the disc tray or putting the disc tray in the housing. With this loading mechanism, an optical disc to be read or written is loaded into/ejected from the housing.
In such an information processor, if the loading mechanism of the ODD experiences a sudden failure, an optical disc cannot be loaded/ejected, resulting in inconvenience for the user. For this reason, some information processors with the ODD is capable of failure prediction and checks whether there is a risk of failure in the ODD.
Japanese Patent Application Publication (KOKAI) No. 2006-18955 discloses a known conventional technology related to ODD failure prediction. With the conventional technology, the number of loadings of the ODD, the number of seeks, and the number of data write blocks are counted and, when any of them exceeds a threshold, the use of the ODD or writing is prohibited.
According to the conventional technology, the risk of failure in the loading mechanism of the ODD is checked based only on the number of loadings as an index. When the number of loadings exceeds a predetermined threshold, it is determined that there is a risk of failure. Accordingly, failure prediction cannot be performed by taking into account the individual difference of the loading mechanism, user's use condition, and the like. As a result, highly accurate failure prediction cannot be achieved.